So I am riding along and then suddenly I notice the dash is dead. The everything on the dash speedo is not reading. Lights front and back work but turn signals will not flash either. When I take a left hand turn it all comes to life briefly and then dead again. I checked obvious wiring shorts that could possibly be the cause and nothing is visible. So it is horn does not work, no turn signals, no speedo, gas gauge, or indicator lights work. The light that lights up the dash does work and all headlights and tail lights work and no fuses are blown. The rear horn is still in place however the front horn was removed by the PO with a light brown with white stripe wire left hanging and a red wire next to it left hanging with no wire exposed or shorting out. It is clearly some kind of short but I am not electronically gifted enough to know where to begin. Any ideas of where to look for and where to begin?

Did you check the connectors under the dash? And in the headlight bucket?

Tug wrote:
Did you check the connectors under the dash? And in the headlight bucket?

That's where I would start.

Quite often, when replacing the wire bundles in the above mentioned places, we tend to try and stuff them in so that we can reassemble the bike so that we can go riding or some other, less important chore awaits us. Carefully examine each wire connection in the above named areas to ensure that wiring connections don't have sharp bends in them or have tension exerted on them, especially when turning the handlebars from side -to-side. As an example, when I replaced my stock horns with a WOLO Bad Boy, I had to wire everything up to a relay, which I stuffed up under the left side cover. Some time later, I experienced a flickering neutral gear indication light that would shut off the engine when it went out. After buying a new neutral indicator switch and discovering how basic it is, I eventually discovered that the wire from that switch had been pulled to one side and tension applied to it when I shoved the wiring under the side cover. A more orderly alignment of the wiring under said cover corrected the problem.

I have checked th3 dash connections and they are fine (pluged/unpluged several times cleaned connections etc). So I did not check the bucket connections as I did not think they came into play with the dash but I will pull the headlight and check that when I get home. I did change the headlight and the trim ring about 2 months ago when I got a tribar headlight and Royal Star trim ring so maybe that was sloppiness on my part. Thanks for the info.

check the easy things like the battery cable connections. if they are clean and tight start wiggling the harneses until you find one that makes the dash work, then fix the issue in that harness

I did the wiggle and my 5 year old son thought it was funny. Ha. So I went to the local dealer and the mechanic said he could not get to it till July 8th and then spent the next half hour going over with me in the parking lot the various easy things it could be. Great guy. So he suggested that I check each of the little female pin connectors in the dash plugs as they can get pushed apart and lose contact when the male pins are inserted. They get widened over time and can lose contact. Sounds like a few ladies I have known over time but that is another story. In any case I will be taking that approach and check those to see if there is a lack of firm contact with those as it is obviously a grounding issue or a non-contact issue. Since I am trying to get my first chapter in my doctoral thesis in this week I have to wait until friday night when I can spend the time with her. Thanks for the suggestion. I have until the end of July as that is when the state inspection is needed and it works fine just no horn, blinkers, speedo, or gas gauge consistently. Maybe it will be a non issue after Celina when I am riding the Blue Max (cause my ticket said I was the winner right on it) for the remainder of the summer.

When this exact thing happened to me, I eventually traced it back to a short in the rear brake wire that was caused when I replaced my regulator/rectifier and foolishly pinned the wire behind it when I re-secured the regulator with the screws.

I doubt that's what's happened to you, but just in case...

good luck!

George

theshredbaron wrote:
When this exact thing happened to me, I eventually traced it back to a short in the rear brake wire that was caused when I replaced my regulator/rectifier and foolishly pinned the wire behind it when I re-secured the regulator with the screws.

I doubt that's what's happened to you, but just in case...

good luck!

George

You may have something there as I did the rewire of the rear end lights several months ago to convert to the run/turn/brake type as in the tech article. I was trying to be very careful on install but something may have come lose and is shorting or something. I will start there as it is easier to check than the whole male/female fit thing. Thanks for the direction.

thats a bunch of bolchevick. pull the meter, see if its connected, check in the headlight you dont have a mouse chewing in there, and use a voltmeter, see if there is power to the meter.
but u could start with the brakelight? WTF?